"Free" music pak should just be completely 'free'!

I'm having lots of random issues with the free music pak... from having it crash on me on installation and GW not recognizing it, and DRM crap being a pain to deal with.

My firewall also seems to be catching the music files trying to authenticate themselves... bleh. That starts getting really annoying if they have to keep authenticating everytime.

Since this is a "free" music pak... why not just make them all mp3s we can download instead of having to deal with some DRM junk? :|

I'll take whatever loss in bitrate any day just for flexibility.

/signed

I love GW music, I absolutely WOULD pay for the additional soundtrack if it could come in a standardized sound format (aka MP3), but the day I am going to spend money for some DRM Handcuffware will be the day the hell freezes over.

Had to chance to check it out yet, but the "free" part has some DRM junk? no thanks, they can keep it, unless they pay me 100$ a month for enduring this freedom-destroying dirt.

Wow. Where were you guys when I posted this:

Direct Song: Will you pay?

If you buy the sound track, it comes with unlimited CD burning rights to standard audio cd. You can then use that cd for mp3 conversion, itunes, throw it on your iPod, etc. Sorrow's Furnace on the other hand does not give cd-burning rights but it's free.

I also had issues with the integration and it was windows media player (issues) at first. Could play the files fine after that. Then an issue where the I moved the original (pre gw integration) from the install and the update going to the "old" location putting everything out of wack (still could play the files fine normally). So I do agree with you there. With firewall, let WMP have full access to the web.

I have d/l'd the new music and had absolutely NO problems with it. It is awesome. Just hearing new music as soon as you enter the new areas made it that much more exciting. It's like wow! this is it!

Everyone does realize that you don't have to authenticate the files if you are just gonna listen to them in game. So the whole thing about people having to deal with WMP and all that is moot. I mean you don't even have to give Direct Song your real name or E-mail. You just have to remember it to log in.

Even if you want to listen to the music out of game Direct song gives you 4 permanent licences with a new one every 6 months and 2 temp 8 hours ones every day.

It's funny that people feel that just dl the file from DS and installing it into a file is somhow cheating them out of some money. The OP's topic is corectly worded however, the FREE music pack is completely FREE. At least I didn't have to pay any money for it. I don't know what the first three posters are doing wrong. (unless you like to just moan about how companies have the right to protect themselves against piracy just cause it's inconvient for your..... yeah that makes the dl not free riiiiiight)

I've downloaded it but can't use it which is a shame, pausing for 10 seconds everytime it chanegs song is just not acceptable.

and then a few hours, it's like, that's it!?

Actually you have to license the music to your pc in order to get it to work for the Official Soundtrack, not sure of the new one, still trying to get there. The Expansion will most likely be the same way. Here's how I get around DRM and legit activation via internet for apps I own 100%.

Create a base install of your OS and fully patch it / upgraded drivers. Install any internet "activated" stuff. Make a image of your hard drive such as Norton Ghost. When your machine goes nuts, re-images your machine with the base image and you can create updated "images" as you acquire like software (always keep your "base") and update patches / drivers and create a new image.